APICS magazine’s excellent “The Business Behind Green” by Tim Becker of Probity Business Group (membership required), warns to watch out for the hype behind green:
“A recent study by TerraChoice….reviewed 1,018 products making environmental claims. Only one product met all six of TerraChoice’s criteria for truthfulness.”
This overstated environmental record should caution companies to avoid overstating it’s own products and services:
“Green marketing likely will be held to a higher standard-similar to marketing of health-related products.”
The current media darling is climate change, but Becker warns of other environmental issues that can have as large, or larger, impact:
Water: “…70 percent of the earth’s freshwater …read more

APICS magazine’s “The Business Behind Green” by Tim Becker reveals a “green anxiety” in corporate America due to the increased media coverage of all things green. Responding to “green anxiety” can be hazardous especially when business basics are not applied to green projects; i.e, running the numbers and aligning green projects with corporate strategies.
The article encourages doing project business cases, i.e., running the numbers, but also cautions consideration of some unique factors, for example:
“[Only] a small number of customers will pay a significant premium for green products; the vast majority will not. A recent study of wood products found that …read more

Green. The word evokes conversations about global warming, the environment, and plastic bag bans. An excellent APICS magazine article by Tim Becker of Probity Business Group, “The Business Behind Green“, introduced the topic (sorry, hefty membership to APICS is required to view the article):
“Eventually, the green tide will ebb as environmental stories are pushed off the front page by some other pressing crisis. However, it is clear that environmentalism has reached a level that requires a coherent and long-term corporate strategy.”
This idea of being on the “front page” makes it difficult for businesses to know what action to take. Environmentalism …read more